Ted Cruz might be trapped on immigration

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas). CNBC/screengrab The Post reports: "Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) — who has spent the past few weeks taking oblique swipes at Senate colleague and presidential rival Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) — was sharply critical Thursday, blasting Rubio for his support of a failed immigration reform bill that would have granted a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants."

This is no surprise, as Cruz has been whipping the anti-immigration reform fervor for a couple of years now. Plainly, he intends to run on the issue, but can he?

What we discovered today is that while he would like to attack Rubio from the right, Cruz has his own problem on the right: He's not really an anti-immigration reform zealot; he just plays one on TV.

Cruz is too smart to advocate rounding up millions of people and deporting them, as Donald Trump does. Instead he tries to duck the question as to what he would do after securing the border. Consider this exchange from "Meet the Press" in July:

NBC'S CHUCK TODD: So let's go to immigration. What do you do with the 11 million?

CRUZ: You know, it's an interesting thing in Washington. That is the question that both President Obama and Democrats love to focus on. How do you solve the problem? You focus on areas of common ground. I am long term optimistic and short term pessimistic on immigration. Long term, I'm optimistic because there's a lot of bipartisan agreement outside of Washington on immigration. There's overwhelming bipartisan agreement, number one, that we need to secure the borders. That we need to finally do something to stop illegal immigration.

TODD: What do you do with the 11 million people though? Do you have to send 'em back, or do you give them a way to get legal?

CRUZ: Chuck, I don't accept the premise that you have to solve every aspect of this problem all at once. President Obama and the Democrats focus on that issue because the question you're asking is the most divisive partisan question in this entire debate. And I don't believe President Obama wants to solve this.

TODD: I understand that it's divisive. But the- it's still a problem.

CRUZ: But you don't have to solve every problem at once. Look, here's the problem-

TODD: That's fine. But explain how you do it?

CRUZ: I am explaining how. The last time Congress passed immigration reform was in the 1980s. And Congress came to the American people with the following tradeoff. Congress said there were three million people living here illegally. Congress said, "We will grant amnesty to those three million. In exchange, we're gonna secure the borders. We're gonna solve the problem so that illegal immigration goes away." Well, we all know what happens. The amnesty happened. And the border never got secured. And here's the sad truth. A lot of Republicans in the Washington cartel, they're all for amnesty too because from the perspective of the Chamber of Commerce and Wall Street, it's cheap labor.

TODD: You still didn't say what you'd do with the 11 million.

CRUZ: Well, my view is first, we secure the borders and solve the problem of illegal immigration. And then I think we can have a conversation about what to do about the people who remain here. I don't think the American people will accept any solution until we demonstrate step number one, we can secure the border.

TODD: So anything's on the table? Potentially deportation or not deportation, but anything's on the table for the 11 million-

CRUZ: I think we should secure the border and then have a conversation at that point. Stop using the Washington approach of I'll gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today. The American people aren't going for it.

Duck, evade. Filibuster. Duck some more. Cruz, you see, is trapped. He cannot risk sounding like a lunatic by urging mass deportation. But if he fesses up that yes, we have to have "a conversation" about that, his "no amnesty" position is revealed to be a big phony, empty catch phrase.

One more factor to consider: Cruz, to his credit, has supported a huge expansion of the H-1B visa program. That does not sit well with the anti-immigrant crowed, the radio talk show hosts and others like Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) who inveigh against foreigners stealing our jobs. But by gosh, Cruz is just like Jeb Bush and Rubio on the issue.

In short, Cruz would love to smear Rubio as a proponent of "open borders." The problem is Cruz has to eventually answer what he would do: join Trump or give up the canard about opposing "amnesty."